Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Construction Update - July 22, 2010

Thanks to all who attended the ribbon cutting on the 100 Block Monday. The Block Party committee is continuing to make plans for the larger event now tentatively planned for September 10, 2010. Please contact the City Office of Special Events if you have ideas or want to be included in our celebration.

This week the Contractor is working on correcting the issues we have with the concrete surface and that has included having to use the concrete saw to remove some of the sections of pavement. This is a noisy and dusty process as you all know but we hope to get this completed by the end of the week and pour new concrete shortly thereafter. Then we will need a least a couple of weeks for the concrete to cure so we are thinking now that the road will probably reopen a little after the first of August.

There are still many items to finish on our punch list and we will continue to work on those issues after the road is opened. Certainly caulking all of the areas will take some time.

Many of you have asked about bike racks and we have those ready to be installed. Sometime soon we will begin installing the street signs and that will involve drilling holes in the sidewalk so we plan to drill the holes and install the bike racks at the same time. We were very happy to have the planter boxes with greenery by the ribbon cutting but even more plants will be going in as well. The trees may be delivered late next month and we will wait for the optimum time to plant those. Those are 20-25 foot elms as I understand it.

The sod for the Cradle of Country Music Park should also arrive finally next month so we can begin to finish that bit of work.

We are beginning to have issues with folks parking on the 100 Block, particularly at night. We have instructed KPD to keep a close watch on this and if you park there you will be cited and/or towed. We have placed no parking signs there, but folk are removing the barricades and entering the work zone. We all want this project to finish and have the road reopened as soon as possible and this is the type of situation that could cause real delays.

We have finally reopened Jackson Avenue for traffic a few days later than we had planned. We replaced the asphalt that was there before we began our work a couple of weeks ago. This asphalt does cover up a small portion of the brickwork but this is the way it has been for many years and is a result of the elevation of the Gay Street Viaduct. This issue will likely get revisited in the next couple of years when the Jackson Avenue Ramps undergo reconstruction.

The Contractor is beginning to remove his construction materials from the Jackson Avenue parking lot in anticipation of the lot reconstruction in August. The picture above is of a camper moved onto the lot a week or so ago. The Contractor came in early one night this week to discover the occupant here had "borrowed" an extension cord to hook into the Construction trailer for power. Obviously our parking lot is not a campground so we had this removed.

Last, congratulations to our friend Stanton Webster of Nama on the birth of his daughter, Sophia Estelle Webster.